[Red John]

Some more thoughts as promised:

-History has been made! What an incredible gutsy effort - coming back from 0-3 down to win is impressive enough, to do it with 4 defensemen and basically a missing forward line (including the team MVP) is something else entirely.

-As mentioned earlier series could have gone either way with 5 of the 7 games needing OT...but it felt all along that the Rockets would pull it out, it was just meant to be even after the tying goal with 7 seconds left.

-Kelowna really struggled to adjust their game to the playoffs - goals are MUCH harder to come by in the postseason and a young Rockets team struggled to understand that, their patented cross-ice passes and easy slot feeds weren't available and by the time they figured this out, it was very nearly too late losing the first three.

-Players in particular who struggled and need to be much better are Zach Franko, Ryan Olsen and Myles Bell. Kelowna scored a TON of goals this season but did it without a de facto star up front; the problem with a scoring by committee approach is that different players need to be chipping in all the time and this didn't happen against Seattle....however...

-......the Rockets are fortunate that of all people it's 16-year old Tyson Baillie who picked this team up on his back and won them this series. Incredible - scouts are noticing. Kelowna has always struggled to develop NHL forwards and its ironic that the highest drafted may end up being Baillie, who was only a third round bantam pick and really has been off everyones radar until recently.

-Building was incredibly loud last night, it felt like a Finals game and really all that was missing was a trophy presentation after. For a building that's known to be pretty quiet, that was nice to see.

-It's really too bad the Rockets didn't trade for some depth for the playoffs - yes this was supposed to be a rebuilding year but when you win 52 games you expect to go deep in the playoffs and need depth for injuries. Instead the Rockets have 4 defensemen heading into a series against the Kamloops Blazers and it will probably be their undoing.

-Will be very interesting to see how the series with the Blazers progresses - they are a polar opposite team to the T-birds and we'll see if this ends up favouring the Rockets or not - it certainly won't be as physical but can Kelowna afford to run and gun with Kamloops? Be curious to see what strategies Huska employs

-There are only two outcomes after this kind of emotional win: either the Rockets will roll to the Memorial Cup on the back of this win, or they will have absolutely nothing left in the tank to give and bow out feebly to Kamloops (who is a darn good team this year and have a healthy team besides Bozon). Smart money says to bet on the latter, but the Rockets have proven you can't count them out!

-How good might Kelowna be next year and after? They don't lose any significant 20s, and probably won't lose anyone to the NHL either. Bowey, Lees and Wheaton will get drafted and return even better next year. They'll probably get Myles Bell back as a 20, and will have two starting calibre goalies (Cooke and Whistle, who will also get drafted). They can decide what to do with Franko as a 20 next year if they want him, and still have room to add one or two more impact 20s from other teams depending if they trade Cooke. Not to mention having Baillie and Rourke Chartier in their draft years, and a full year of highly touted Nick Merkley. This team is just on the beginning of their upswing and this could be looked back on as a dominant era for them depending on their playoff success.